Web servers generally contain relatively large amounts of information, some of which may be of a confidential or sensitive nature. For example, web servers may contain financial, personal, and other types of sensitive or confidential information. Therefore, maintaining the security of the web server from unauthorized access is an important measure for both individuals and entities hosting the web services as well as individuals or entities storing information on the web server.
One method of protecting the web server includes a firewall. Firewalls generally prevent unauthorized access to various portions of the web server. However, even with active firewalls in place, servers may remain susceptible to unauthorized access. For example, servers may remain susceptible to buffer overflows, format bugs, parser problems or irregularities, unauthorized access to restricted areas, and other various attack methods.